Windows XP Users warned on Malware Increase

Microsoft on Saturday warned users still stuck on Windows XP that the operating system will be prone to malware attacks more than ever before starting April 8, 2014. The warning came on the heels of the company's bi-annual security intelligence report.

Tim Rains, director at Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing Group, in a blog post iterated on the risks posed by the aged operating system, stating that users should expect an increase in malware attacks when support for the OS is dropped next year.

Windows XP will become more prone to attacks, continued Tim, and that after support ends, attackers will have upper hand over security tools on the operating system.

The company perhaps for the first time has been open about the risks customer may face after dropping support for an OS, which is unusual to its norm of simply ignoring an old operating system without accompanying danger tag. While there could be other reasons for the purported increase in infections, lack of updated security software been among, main reason remains the fact that XP SP2 has not been patched.